


no widow's braids in the halls of waiting

by Saraste



Series: Nwalin Week 2018 [5]
Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Braids, Character Death, Day 5: Metal, Erebor Reclaimed, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Nwalin Week 2018, Partial Fix-It, Someone always dies, This isn't a happy ficlet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-25
Updated: 2018-05-25
Packaged: 2019-05-13 18:19:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 357
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14753894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Saraste/pseuds/Saraste
Summary: In the end, dying is easier than living with widow's braids.





	no widow's braids in the halls of waiting

**Author's Note:**

> Written for day 5. ~~gemstones~~ or metal of nwalin week 2018.
> 
> NOT A HAPPY FIC!

In the end, it doesn’t feel like much of anything, when it happens, in a dark alley when he’s in a dark mood, fingers absent on a braid he cannot unweave, even after all this time. Breath is punched out of him and there’s wetness on his palm as he touches where metal has cut into flesh, footsteps echoing away as blood rushes in his ears.

Nori’s killed enough to know he’s not walking away from this.

He can’t say he sought it out, not really, not even when he has.

Because Dwalin isn’t there to tell him no.

Because Dwalin isn’t there to kiss him, braid him and hold him close,  _ to share a life with him _ , as he should be, but isn’t.

Because all Nori has of Dwalin now are his twin axes and the widows braids he’s grown to hate with a passion, and the deep rending ache in his heart which he wakes to every single day in a cold bed that ought be warm and full of a grinning Dwalin, ready to kiss him.

Nori really should have known than happiness was not for the likes of him, he had been allowed to just taste at it, have his cup overflowing and then have it all snatched away.

The Mountain is empty to him because Dwalin never really reclaimed it, for being given back to stone isn’t reclaiming, letting your blood flow out for your King and kin isn’t reclaiming, no matter what the fucking bards sing.

Nori knows that Dwalin would hate his resentment of Thorin and of Thorin’s happiness, the consort-braids in undwarven hair.

There is blood in Nori’s mouth and he’s hard of breath, numb of finger and cold of limb and  _ glad  _ as he lets stone embrace him as he keels over.

The metal is cold in his body, welcome, and Nori should feel bad, knows Ori will mourn and Dori mask his sorrow into a lecture, but…

Nori closes his eyes, forces his numb fingers around the knife's handle and pulls, smiling…

For Dwalin is waiting and there’ll be no widows braids in the Halls of Waiting. 


End file.
